Hey guys! Hope all is well with everyone today. I have a couple of things that I could write about and even now, I'm debating over which one (world issues and the Live8/one.org, girls and relationships, spiritual matters).

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I think I'm going to do a mix of relationships and spiritual matters...

So I was reading off this guy friend's website. This girl posted something like "i don't fall in love with guys right away" and "God will take care of it", yada yada yada. You get the idea, and worse, you've probably heard it a few times, maybe ever used the God excuse. Let me say this off before I get going here. This is my thought with God and relationships: I think you know if you're ready for a relationship, whether the person is worth dating or has characteristics you want in a person, and just whether or not you should be in one period. When it comes to relationship and involving God, I don't feel this intrinsic need to pray about it, because God gave me a brain, desires, feelings, and from these God gifts, I aught to be able to discern if there is compatibility or not, whether this relationship will be mutually beneficial. There are other things too I think, but this is the gist of what I want to touch on.

I can't count the times when I've heard Christians say, "God's telling me to wait", "I"ll pray about it" (my personal favorite), "God will show me the right person"...and so on, They go on.

And any time I hear these things, I wonder, "have you lost your ability to function as a human being?" If you can't tell whether a person is good or not, you haven't been around them long enough. If you don't think you're ready for a relationship, or whether a particular person is someone you want to get into a relationship with, then just don't. Existence doesn't stop if you're not in a relationship with someone (although after a while, it feels like it). And saying "God will take care of it" does not absolve you from participating in looking for someone. This one gets me every time. As if God is now a matchmaker and you have no part to play in your life anymore. That's just lazy.

Folks, if you want to involve God in your relationships, great. Just don't expect God to do all the work. He created you for a certain reason, with certain likes and dis-likes, what works for you and what doesn't, and I think we all know what those things are for each of us. If you don't, there are personality tests and classes and books by experts that you can read up on. Maybe this whole declaration makes me some sort of agnostic Christian, but at least I'm not living in a fantasy world, where God just comes down and anoints my life, makes everything perfect, happily ever after. I'd bet most of these folks that run so adimantly to God when the relationship starts feel a little less inclined to do so when things go wrong.

God will prosper you, but he's not going to beam sunshine up your ass. That's not how things work. You take what's good, what's bad, and you go on. Life doesn't stop when things are amazing, or when it sucks. That's life.

So am I happy with my life and relationships? Not really, but I don't blame God for that.

As always, I don't know if I said everything I wanted to say, but if you have some thoughts, post'em. At least that lets me know one person is reading!

Shalom and bis später!